a beer blog about portland, oregon and all the wonderful craft beer in our fair city. we're craft beer ambassadors & beer geek enthusiasts; we meet up over tasty beers. some of us homebrew, a few of us are pro brewers, some of us are hobbyists, and some are firmly entrenched in the portland craft beer scene!

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Friday, January 13, 2012

Jack Harris from Fort George fills us in!

** many thanks to Jack Harris, head brewer at Fort George for
sending this update and filling us in on all the happenings out at Fort George
in Astoria!

YEAR IN RE-BREW + BEER TO COME

By Jack Harris

As the City of Astoria went into high-gear to celebrate its bicentennial, Fort
George ended nine months of demolition and construction was able to stretch its
legs into the huge Lovell Building. Making beer 140 kegs at a time rather than
40 improved our efficiencies and elicited many a “That’s a LOT
of beer!” from the brew-staff.

Our canning line arrived early in the year and we immediately put it into use
gift-wrapping beers into convenient 16 ounce bundles of joy specifically
created to honor Astoria’s
Birthday, the 1811 Lager. We hired a local distribution staff, and started
shipping our beer in large quantities throughout Oregon with Maletis Distributing.

We added a cozy new Tap-room and game area to compliment the pub and worked
hard to revamp the menu in response to guest requests. In the meantime
the pub kept working to provide a space for people to gather and
celebrate. Brewers attended countless festivals, tastings, tap-takeovers,
dinners and celebrations to put a face on our beer and preach their love of
drinking it.

By the end of the year we had both breweries running like tops, our cooler
bursting at the seams and three new tanks under construction that will triple
our capacity. Our staff has nearly doubled from the end to 2010. We have cleaned
out the upstairs of the Fort
George Building
in preparation for a long overdue pub expansion.

So I leave you with the best of wishes for 2012 (aka Astoria’s 201st Anniversary). Thank you so
much for all the support you have given us. To honor that support we resolve to
work even harder this year to get a great beer in your hand and a comfortable
place to enjoy it with the ones you love.

WE'RE
PLANNING MORE FUN FOR YOU

Our bigger space means an even better Stout Month.
This February we're adding the Festival of Dark Arts, featuring a carnival of
the region's top stouts, and entertainment including a tarot card reader,
visual artists, fire dancers, tattoo artists, a live iron forge, and
music. It happens on Saturday, February 18th 2-10 p.m. in the our Lovell
Brewery.

“I wanted to make sure our stout fest would be entertaining, while also
promoting local artists and tying in stout as another art form,” our Jack
Harris explained.

Our breweries will produce at least eight stouts, plus we'll have rotating taps
of the region's best stouts all February.

“We’re working on getting an extremely eclectic range of stouts and it’s going
to be a lot of fun to come and try these in a very unique environment,”
Co-owner, Chris Nemlowill, said.

Also part of Stout Month, the Stouts & Oysters Brewers Dinner Wednesday,
February 15th. Make reservations at www.fortgeorgebrewery.com or us (503) 325-PINT.

INDIAN
CUISINE & IPA'S DINNER

Always a sold-out event, the Indian Cuisine & IPAs
dinner features 5 courses of delicious dishes paired with some of the very best
Northwest-style IPA's. Our head chef, Dana McCauley and his team create a new
and exciting menu every year.

On par with the food and beer is the company of fellow guests at the event, as
well as the hosts, Fort
George owners, Chris
Nemlowill and Jack Harris, who describe each course, sharing stories and
interesting facts with you. To Learn more and
to sign up, click here.

2011 Satori Award Winner: Fort
George 1811 Lager
I loved this beer the first time I had it... I hope customers are so mesmerized
by the shiny blue cans that they ignore the prominent word "lager"
and don't read blogs like this. Because, if they manage to get the beer
into their glass, they're in for a treat. Despite people's expectations
about canned lager, this is quite a lively and assertive beer. And, although it
is packed with flavor, the volume doesn't blast at IPA levels, so it has that
moreishness you want from a summer tipple. Fort
George is one of Oregon's
best breweries, and their wish to honor the founding of their home town, Astoria, makes all this a
lot easier.

In Zen Buddhism, satori is the moment of sudden enlightenment when the mind
realizes its own true nature.

KEEPING YOU
BETTER INFORMED

If you work in marketing at the Fort George,
chances are you'll be doing fun stuff such as attending beer festivals,
curating art shows, and serving french fries, but recently a project came up
that had our Brian Bovenizer staring at a computer screen for months. He
says the new and improved www.fortgeorgebrewery.com was definitely worth it though.

"Letting people know what we're doing, that is my inspiration, a good web
site is not just good looking, but informative and easy to navigate,"
Bovenizer said.

Our old web site was truly unique and awesome, but tough to update. The new one
is completely dynamic. Do expect to see any and all new beers from Fort George,
including description, and ingredients. Plus, a fresh listing of music
and other events.

So check out the new www.fortgeorgebrewery.com and you can even download the Fort George
theme song, "Beer, beer, beer, beer...", as a ringtone.